Mallarmé and the hidden music

Starting from the concept of poetry which, according to Mallarmé, is to deprive music of what it has unjustly appropriated, this article deals with the issue of the "aesthetics of dissimulation". These aesthetics define the musicality in Mallarmé's works with regard to both musical topics and the transfer of musical techniques to literature. Dissimulation seems to be a characteristic feature of music itself (the spiritual art which is the reflection of the Idea - spatial and temporal as well) and an artistic tool used by the poet to achieve the ideal of poetry. The concealed music - music of silence made by the intellectual word - pretends to be the aforementioned ideal. The analysis of a few of Mallarmé's verses shows the literary process of gradually declining sounds in favour of a silent concerto resonating in the reader's mind. Un Coup de Dés which is an example of literary partition is the high point of Mallarmé's experiments and the highest level of his poetic dissimulation.

Keywords: Mallarmé; music; poetry; dissimulation; ideal; silence; partition